Four truths are emerging: First, the battle is not between gay rights and religious liberty—although religious liberty is certainly at stake—but between the sexual revolution and Christianity itself. This means that Christians are faced not with allegedly “minor” or “insignificant” theological changes to gain leftist acceptance, but with wholesale changes to the historical doctrines of the church.

has proven to be more true than I thought imaginable and more rapidly so.

There is plenty of evidence for French’s contention, much that predates any of the recent events, but what is occurring is more in the nature of a collapse than a slow “evolution.” In my denomination, the battle for ordination of those openly practicing homosexuality is decades old and thus looks like an evolution. But the collapse is evident in this op-ed from The Telegraph concerning the “re-baptism” of the transgendered.

Should a “transgender” person be allowed a ceremony of “re-baptism” at their local church? That is what a parishioner requested from the Rev Chris Newlands, Vicar of Lancaster.

WOW! – just WOW! As Christopher Howse, the author of the piece points out – these people seem to think of baptism as a naming ceremony of some sort, which reveals a gross misunderstanding of the sacrament, but there is something much deeper at play here. It is a complete reversal of the traditional role of the church. Continue Reading

Calmes is a pro’s pro, however, and her tone throughout –serious, sometimes amused, and always responsive and candid– is refreshing for a member of the D.C. reportorial elite at the Times (and previously the Journal). I look forward to her return to the show (and someday to Halperin’s, who told me he’d be back on the set of Morning Joe not long ago, but we’ll see…)

HH: So pleased to welcome to the program now Jackie Calmes, national correspondent for the New York Times. You often see her on Washington Week in Review. She has been at the New York Times a lot of years. She also had 18 years at the Wall Street Journal. More importantly for my audience, she is a Toledo Mud Hen. She’s actually from Ohio originally. She is a Medill mafia person. She’s a Northwestern gal. But nevertheless, we are so pleased to welcome Jackie, a fellow Buckeye, great to have you.

JC: Wow, you’ve really done your homework on me.

HH: I know these things.

JC: I mean, when you can include the Mud Hens, that’s saying something.

HH: Well, which high school did you go to in Toledo?

JC: Central Catholic High School.

HH: All right. So I just had a feeling about this. I had…

JC: The Fighting Irish.

HH: The Fighting Irish, and I went to John F. Kennedy High School in Warren, Ohio, and we were the Eagles. But the Fighting Irish were at Canton Central Catholic, I believe. I mean, everyone was the Fighting Irish in all the Catholic schools hung together. And my daughter’s a Northwestern grad, and so I know the Medill mafia all through Washington, D.C. But you must have been one of the early Medill mafia to sort of blaze the way there.

JC: Well, I went to the, I started as a freshman there, and then I realized I wasn’t going to be able to afford it, so I went back to Toledo and I came back for graduate school. So I don’t have as much of a network of Northwestern people as I might have if I had gone there for four years as an undergraduate. But there are a fair number, and that’s why I went, because it was a good, it had such a good reputation. Continue Reading

HH: But I really want to talk with Chuck Todd, host of Meet the Press, about the fact that he’s mono y mono with Jake Tapper, the only guys I know that go to work every day of the week in Washington, D.C.. Announced today that Chuck Todd [is] taking over a 5 p.m. EST, 2 p.m. pacific daily news show, which makes him now show prep for me. What are you, out of your mind, Chuck?

CT: Well… I have the daily, man. I have missed my old show. I’ve missed the itch. I can’t tell you how many times we’ve had the conversation, you know, I said this all on the show on Sunday and the answer is… I can’t! So guess what? I got five more hours to play with that. Continue Reading

HH: I’m great. I want to talk to you about your time as a prosecutor. I like to tell people I worked at the Department of Justice, but I didn’t stay at a Holiday Inn, so I don’t really know anything about prosecuting. What kind of a banana republic are we running when the former Secretary of State’s lawyers got a thumb drive with 30,000 emails, and scores of which are classified? What’s going on here?

CC: Well you know, listen, this is typical of the Clintons, Hugh. They set their own rules. And then they look at you say are you going to believe me or your lying eyes? This is the typical approach to the Clintons. They stonewall, they obfuscate, they don’t tell the truth. And you know, this’ll be a good test for Attorney General Lynch. Is she going to look into this, the entire email circumstance, or isn’t she? And I think it’s a good test for the new Attorney General. Continue Reading